6 d. ago China airs confession from northern Myanmar crime boss Wei Hauiren

Criminal gangs in northern Myanmar targeted Chinese citizens with the support of local political and military leaders, state media has reported. On Wednesday, the national broadcaster CCTV aired a confession from the head of an alleged crime family Wei Huairen, who is also known as Wai San. Wei was handed over to Chinese law enforcement in January. A police officer told the broadcaster that the criminal activities of the Wei family – one of the main ethnically Chinese crime gangs in Kokang – had...

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6 d. ago China airs confession from northern Myanmar crime boss Wei Huairen

Criminal gangs in northern Myanmar targeted Chinese citizens with the support of local political and military leaders, state media has reported. On Wednesday, the national broadcaster CCTV aired a confession from the head of an alleged crime family Wei Huairen, who is also known as Wai San. Wei was handed over to Chinese law enforcement in January. A police officer told the broadcaster that the criminal activities of the Wei family – one of the main ethnically Chinese crime gangs in Kokang – had...

Events

6 d. ago China court grants woman divorce 6 years after husband pushed her off Thai cliff

A court in China has granted the divorce application of a woman who survived after being pushed off a cliff in Thailand by her husband six years ago, sparking massive cheers on social media. Wang Nan, 38, better known online as Wang Nuannuan, suffered severe injuries after Yu Xiaodong pushed her off a 34-metre-high cliff while they were on holiday in a national park in Thailand in June 2019. She was pregnant for three months at the time and thus lost her unborn child in the autumn. Yu, who...

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7 d. ago DJI appeals inclusion on Pentagon’s ‘Chinese military companies’ list

Chinese drone maker DJI has appealed a US federal court’s decision that it should remain on the Pentagon’s blacklist of companies allegedly linked to China’s military. The Shenzhen-based company filed the appeal on Monday to the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit. DJI filed a lawsuit last October, arguing that it is not owned or controlled by the Chinese military and does not contribute to China’s defence industrial base. The drone manufacturer, which sells over half of all US commercial...

Events

2 w. ago French court to try Chinese captain from Russia’s shadow fleet tanker

The Chinese captain of a tanker from Russia’s “shadow fleet” is to be tried in a French court early next year for refusing to comply with orders from French authorities, prosecutors said on Thursday. The captain and first mate of the Boracay, a Benin-flagged vessel blacklisted by the European Union off France, were detained on Tuesday for refusing to provide evidence of nationality or cooperate with French authorities. The captain has been summoned to appear in court in February, but the first...

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3 w. ago Chinese woman admits US$7.4 billion bitcoin fraud at UK court

A 47-year-old Chinese woman on Monday told a UK court that she played a leading role in a multibillion-pound fraudulent bitcoin scheme. Businesswoman Qian Zhimin, alias Zhang Yadi, pleaded guilty at London’s Southwark Crown Court following what is believed to be the single largest cryptocurrency seizure in the world, now worth about £5.5 billion (US$7.4 billion). Qian admitted one count of possessing criminal property and one count of transferring criminal property. Judge Sally-Ann Hales...

Economics

3 w. ago Chinese court sentences 16 people linked to Myanmar crime family to death

A Chinese court sentenced 16 people linked to a notorious Myanmar-based telecoms fraud group to death on Monday for crimes including fraud, drug trafficking and prostitution. According to state broadcaster CCTV, prosecutors in the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang found that since 2015 the Ming family crime gang had used its influence in Myanmar’s Kokang region to set up a number of “parks” and collude with financial backers to carry out criminal activities. Those activities – encompassing...

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3 w. ago Drone maker DJI loses lawsuit against Pentagon claim of Chinese military ties

A US judge on Friday rejected a bid by China-based DJI, the world’s largest drone maker, to be removed from the US Defence Department’s list of companies allegedly working with Beijing’s military. In his ruling, US District Judge Paul Friedman in Washington said the Defence Department had substantial evidence supporting its finding that DJI, which sells more than half of all US commercial drones, contributes to the “Chinese defence industrial base”. DJI had urged the court to order its removal...

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